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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27305383">A New Beginning</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosewaterangel/pseuds/rosewaterangel'>rosewaterangel</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Avatar: Legend of Korra, Avatar: The Last Airbender</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Canon Compliant, Gen, Mother-Daughter Relationship, Post-Canon, Pre-Canon, i guess its both depending on how you look at it, i thought itd be cute to think abt how she deals with being a mom!, kataras only there briefly, new mom toph</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-10-31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-10-31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 19:48:32</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>811</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27305383</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosewaterangel/pseuds/rosewaterangel</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Toph is having... a difficult time adjusting to having a new roommate. She keeps screaming and shitting everywhere. What a little brat!</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Lin Beifong &amp; Toph Beifong</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>57</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>A New Beginning</h2></a>
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    <p>Lin wasn’t a particularly small infant. She was so large that Toph’s friends honestly wondered if the hospital screwed up and handed her the wrong baby. How could something that big come out of her? She was such a petite person…</p><p>But it didn’t matter what they thought, Toph knew this was her kid, despite her size. As soon as the baby was laid down on her chest, she knew. That little heartbeat was the same one she had felt inside her. Yes, Lin was indisputably Toph’s chunky baby.</p><p>Lin wasn’t an easy person to live with, she takes after her mom a little too much. Such a colic-y baby made for an unpleasant housemate. When she would finally calm down, sleeping soundly in her mother’s arms, the world was silent and small and safe.</p><p>Too small! Too safe! And much, much too quiet. Toph never really thought the day would come where she missed having to go into work, but she did. Oh, how she longed to boss someone around! To be at work surrounded by people whose diapers she didn’t have to change, or at least people who knew how to talk. Sure, her friends visited (nearly every day—did they think she couldn’t handle this? That she and the baby would end up dead without their help?), but there was such a difference between Katara dropping off some food she’d made and fighting crime with her coworkers.</p><p>The biggest crime she had to deal with at home was Sokka pinching her daughter’s cheeks. Or how much Lin liked to throw up on Aang. It’s like she had some kind of vendetta against him or something, she puked on him nearly every time he held her. You’d think it would deter him from trying to pick her up, but no, he would every damn time he visited.</p><p>As much as Toph hated being imprisoned in her own home with that damn maternity leave her friends forced upon her, it was nice of them to visit so often. She wasn’t going to compliment Katara’s cooking, it’d go right to her head, but she was a lot better at it than Toph was.</p><p>“You must be so busy right now, with the new baby and all,” She’d say, setting containers of food on the counter, as if she didn’t have a young baby as well. Katara and Tenzin visited nearly every day, both of them dressed and clean, neither had puke in their hair…</p><p>What a showoff!</p><p>Toph’s house was always a mess. Now even more so, and Katara was sure to point it out.</p><p>“I know you’re stressed, but don’t you think the house would smell better if you washed these dishes?” Like, fuck off, she’ll get to it! … No she wouldn’t, but still!</p><p>Katara, who had long since decided to mother Toph, would hand off Tenzin to her and get to work doing the dishes, which honestly only encouraged Toph to leave dirty ones in the sink.</p><p>Tenzin was such a calm baby compared to Lin, and it was never more apparent than those short, 15-minute windows of time when Katara was doing the dishes. Tenzin would sit calmly in Toph’s lap, content to just cuddle with someone, while Lin would be shrieking in her mother’s arms. At first she chalked it up to Tenzin being a few months older, but eventually she realized it was just in Lin’s nature to bitch about every god damn thing.</p><p>Whenever Katara’s check-ins were over and the dishes were done, the house would once again be excruciatingly quiet, and Toph was stuck with her wiggly little cellmate.</p><p>It wasn’t all bad, though. Especially after Lin was able to hold her head up on her own and sleep through the night, she was kind of fun to hang around. And babies really had no problem with rolling around in the dirt. The first great disappointment her daughter brought about was when she started thinking it was gross to sit in a mud puddle.</p><p>But as an infant, Lin wasn’t able to do anything, and sitting in the house with her became such a chore. She sat on her bed, the baby curled up in her arms, just listening to her gentle breathing.</p><p>Motherhood was incredibly foreign to her, she was pretty much flying blind here. But even still, despite how confusing and difficult it was, despite all the times Lin spit up on her or woke her up in the middle of the night, she couldn’t deny how nice it felt to hold her. She’s so small, and all she can feel is love.</p><p>Enduring the first few months of her daughter’s life really isn’t so bad, huh? When Lin finally falls asleep, Toph is left with her tiny girl resting against her chest, soothed by the gentle rhythm of each other’s heartbeats.</p>
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